Outreachy Developers Have Been Making Some Useful Contributions To The Linux Kernel

[rmoog]

It's not discriminatory in a negative way. It's like need-based scholarships that don't want to give money to kids with millionaire parents to attend a low-cost university. Get over it.

I hope Outreachy continues to make tangible contributions and ignores the static and noise that is coming from the stands.

Where was this program when I needed it? Oh, yeah, it disregarded my broke immigrant ass because I'm white, straight and cis-male.

[reavertm]

it's funny you mention medical doctors because that's a recent phenomenon. The vast majority of physicians are men

In US perhaps. In Poland, where unlike in US, medical education does not require significant prior financial investment, women are majority of medical staff, doctors included. I think just surgeons are primarily men (except dental ones, where I would say it's tied).

[skeevy420]

24 hours later and reading these comments I have to ask:

Y'all know that "first world" is America and its allies, "second world" is Russia and its allies", and "third world" is everybody else, right?.

Essentially Democrats & Communists & countries that fall under "If you choose not to decide You still have made a choice".

Rush applies to everything.

[Djhg2000]

In what way is any of the above relevant to the discussion at hand?

So he's not allowed to have an opinion on how people look? I personally don't give a crap but there a lots of people who take great pride in how they look and use it to boost their confidence. Do you really want to take that away from them?

I'd say it is indeed relevant to the discussion because there are only so much time in a day, and if they spend hours to make themselves look good then that time has to come out of something else. Maybe they take it out of studying, maybe they take it out of making friends. Maybe those biology students became inspired to pursue those careers because of how much they are about their bodies.

Whatever the point was isn't for me to answer, but to blatantly say it's irrelevant like that (with whatever implications you intended) without giving it a second thought is borderline dishonest.

[schmidtbag]

He/she/it is still a black trans woman and everyone shitting on that will keep shitthing on that, regardless of the work experience of the individual.

As convoluted as it might sound, some bigots are open-minded enough to change their views. Remember, stuff like racism and sexism is taught. A lot of people blindly follow what they were raised to follow. Only until someone can prove them wrong will they change their mind. Of course, not always, but bigots are proven to change their mind.
Outreachy gives victims of discrimination an opportunity to be that proof. Depending where you're from, you might not be able to get work in your field for discriminatory reasons, and as a result, your resume looks like crap. To my understanding, the whole point of Outreachy is to be a resume builder, hence being an internship and not a job.

Again - I'm not saying this is the right solution, but it does actually do something: it gives such people a chance to prove themselves. Being a hypocrite isn't synonymous with being wrong, it just makes your credibility look like shit.

[GI_Jack]

Wandered into this and, oh wow, the fucking shitshow, as expected.

Personally I think its great, things like outreachy bringing Free software to more people, who otherwise would have given it a pass. Its not kicking anyone out of software, but bringing people in. Especially if the Free Software movement tends to trend a little more male than corporate. This would be a great thing for long term growth and expanding pools of potential contributors.

Before any starts yammering about some incorrect factoids about gender roles, understand that women were the original programmers, as it was women's work, from the start with Lady Lovelace, all the way up until the mid 1970s, when lonely hobbyists didn't have women to program their home machines for them. As Programming/Computer Science continued to eclipse systems engineering in terms of prestige and pay, women where kicked out. So unhistory is not only not true, its reverse.

They are already starting to make contributions to the code, which is far more than most of these 'muh natural order of things', who in all reality don't contribute much but drama, complaints, and conspiracy.

So despite the whining over "meritocracy", outreachy already contributed back more than the "anti-pc whiners"

[Almindor]

I've read those articles. They end with the caveat that, while that may be true and may be partly dependent on things like "women tend to have better language skills, which introduces a statistically significant skew toward writing-related jobs", the nordic countries still have not completely factored out other influcences dissuading women from STEM jobs.

Also, I don't have the URLs handy, but I remember reading that factors like "women tend to have better language skills" aren't inherent but, rather, an artifact of how boys and girls develop different skills at different rates (even if they both wind up in the same place eventually) and how modern curricula line up with those development curves. (eg. math education curricula line up better with the male neurodevelopment curve while language education curricula line up better with the female development curve, which results in boys learning bad cognitive habits surrounding language and feeling more discouraged and vice-versa with math for girls.)

Yes and I also agree that there are definitely social pressure problems when it comes to girls in STEM (or boys in some girl dominated areas as well). These should be eliminated of course. But there are also very interesting studies indicating biological difference stemming (pun intended) from testosterone levels when it comes to cognitive functionality and biases.

The results seemed to indicate that boys (with normal testosterone levels) tend to be more analytical and less social, while girls (with normal testosterone levels) tend to be more social and less analytical in their thinking. I think I agree with this. NOTE: this statement is made as in "on average" btw. and also "less analytical" doesn't imply any kind of disability or "less of a human being" here. The main takeaway I think is that there are biological differences to the sexes mostly due to hormones and other biological functions and it'd be very naive to try and fight those.

Creating equal opportunities and making the playing field fair, yes 100%. Trying for equality of outcome, no, not ever.

[skeevy420]

So how exactly is a stipend not depending on your sex, skin color or religion going to increase diversity in FOSS? Last I checked, Outreachy is about diversity, not helping poor people get a job. If you don't agree with that mission, start your own foundation and gather funds for your cause but don't shit on other foundation's missions.

It's still discrimination based on sex, skin color, or religion. Been illegal for just over 55 years in my country. YMMV.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Pub.L. 88–352, 78 Stat. 241, enacted July 2, 1964) is a landmark civil rights and labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. It prohibits unequal application of voter registration requirements, and racial segregation in schools, employment, and public accommodations.

From Outreachy's main page:

We expressly invite women (both cis and trans), trans men, and genderqueer people to apply. We also expressly invite applications from residents and nationals of the United States of any gender who are Black/African American, Hispanic/Latin@, Native American/American Indian, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, or Pacific Islander. Anyone who faces under-representation, systemic bias, or discrimination in the technology industry of their country is invited to apply.

Oh, look, the exact things that Outreachy uses to make determinations for school and employment are illegal to be used to make determinations for school and employment. For America, their mission statement blatantly spits in the face of our anti-discrimination laws for employment and education.

If what they offered was a non-inclusive program that promoted tolerance and acceptance within the technology community that helped anyone regardless of their background to try to get ahead and succeed that had a preference and bias towards their current mission statement, no one would really have a problem with it.

As an agnostic, would I qualify under the "systemic bias" clause since I live in the American South where "if ya ain't Christian, ya ain't right" and are treated accordingly? Because as a straight, white guy, that's about all I can see, and, to be honest, that's never actually been a factor for anything because they all get to my long hair and discriminate that with the "clean-cut appearance" bullcrap. It really irks me when "but I have a ponytail and a bandanna just like her" is followed with "but you're a guy and that's against dress code policy".

Does long hair discrimination count? That actually does effect me.

[Djhg2000]

Remember, stuff like racism and sexism is taught.

It's really not. You obviously haven't grown up in a particularly diverse environment. It's human instinct to fear the unknown. In the case of racism it's usually fear of those who don't look like you or behave significantly different from what you think is appropriate.

The way to change that is to expose yourself to different people and opinions. Over time you become more accepting of those different people and opinions, but if a green alien speaking gerbaflobb walks in through the door you're right back at fearing the unknown.

Any living organism with a reasonably strong desire of self preservation will show the same behavior. Why do you think cave men are depicted as fearful of everything? Hint: because it resonates with our basic instincts. It subconsciously tells us their world is smaller than ours.

[skeevy420]

It's really not. You obviously haven't grown up in a particularly diverse environment. It's human instinct to fear the unknown. In the case of racism it's usually fear of those who don't look like you or behave significantly different from what you think is appropriate.

The way to change that is to expose yourself to different people and opinions. Over time you become more accepting of those different people and opinions, but if a green alien speaking gerbaflobb walks in through the door you're right back at fearing the unknown.

Any living organism with a reasonably strong desire of self preservation will show the same behavior. Why do you think cave men are depicted as fearful of everything? Hint: because it resonates with our basic instincts. It subconsciously tells us their world is smaller than ours.

My Dad tried to teach me racism but it didn't stick. He became a racist in juvie where the basic rule was "stick with your color or you'll get jumped" and went to a primarily white school whereas I didn't go to juvie and went to a school that was around equal numbers of black and white kids (35%+35%) and everyone else was the remaining 30%.

Well how else is the alien supposed to get the gerbil out? Get a cat stuck up its ass?